EDITORIAL: More neighborhood events like Oktoberfest can boost Beaumont

By Enterprise editorial staff

Published 4:00 am, Friday, July 24, 2015

Will Beaumont soon see an Oktoberfest to join other neighborhood festivals like Juneteenth and Cinco de Mayo? We hope so - if it's done right.

Ward 2 city councilman Mike Getz has proposed an Oktoberfest for Oct. 17 at Rogers Park. The City Council should approve it if issues like cost and street closures can be settled. The most important of these is the sale and availability of alcohol, which could become a major issue.

The open secret about booze is that it can be a great draw for crowds - and a huge problem.

Business owners like Jerry Nelson of Nutty Jerry's and the proprietors of the former Jungle Sports Bar & Grill in Nederland (now the Sombrero restaurant) have noted recently that they simply got tired of dealing with drunks. They revamped their operations to de-emphasize liquor and haven't regretted it.

Alcohol can be a problem at neighborhood festivals too, especially one like Oktoberfest, which is centered around drinking beer. A key issue is banning the "bring your own beverage" concept. At some downtown events, that has led to problems like underage drinking, vomit in rest rooms and even outdoor furniture tossed into Town Lake.

Accordingly, any alcohol sales at an Oktoberfest must be well-regulated, and sufficient police need to be on hand to respond to any problem.

That's doable, however. Neighborhood festivals are one of those quality-of-life issues that can bring energy to a city. Something like Oktoberfest is worth trying - and if for some reason it doesn't work out, that's OK too. On some of these proposals, you never know if it will succeed unless you try it.

City officials should never be criticized for reasonable experimentation like this. In fact, they should be criticized if they aren't thinking of new and better ways to improve Beaumont, even if that's secondary to their main mission of paving streets and keeping drainage ditches cleared.